


can you make our dreams come true?

by KiwisAndTea



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Tony Feels, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, and he gets one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-18
Updated: 2018-10-18
Packaged: 2019-08-03 21:44:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16333784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KiwisAndTea/pseuds/KiwisAndTea
Summary: Silence fills his head when his heart skips two full beats, lungs catching on the air they so desperately need, and his eyes betray him by snapping to the source of the voice. They fall immediately on a vision that sends ice through his veins and then shut petulantly. No. Damn it. Fuck.Fuck.





	can you make our dreams come true?

**Author's Note:**

> You're all obsessed with angst, so here you go. Post-Infinity War. Tony pretty much shut down, and it's implied that the rest of the Avengers (& co.) defeated Thanos. It gets better, though, because I could never let either of them suffer.

The cheap, novelty Death Star clock on the bedside table reads _11:52_. Or 11:32. Or 11:35. It's blurry, and Tony couldn't care less what time it is, except that those little red numbers are the only thing keeping him grounded in his body. They're concrete, steady, poignant, even though one digit changes every sixty-seconds. He doesn't know what day it is. Doesn't care.

He'd hit a low point what feels like eons ago, and had crawled over the wrinkled Millennium Falcon sheets to curl up with the picture of Han Solo that no longer smells like its owner, foolishly seeking comfort where none can be found. He's been here a hundred times and it never even begins to temper the void inside of him. It still aches months (years?) after the fact, still squeezes his chest tight enough for his lungs to burn and beg for oxygen instead of giving out like he wants, still holds him captive in the dark room with posters on the walls and dirty socks on the floor and never a speck of dust anywhere. (He'd realized, a few weeks back, that someone had to be coming in to clean it meticulously every couple of days. He'd cried himself into unconsciousness with relief. The last thing he wanted was to see dust on the pictures of Peter Parker's smiling face.)

Silently, the numbers tick on. _12:03._ 12:08?

It's too quiet. His grief still sinks its claws into his vulnerable mind, still tortures him with thoughts that send a chill down his spine until he's numb. _This room used to be so full of life. It should be full of life_. What it is full of, is depression. The air is stagnant, as if holding its breath, awaiting the arrival of a heartbeat to spark it back to life. Tony's own mocks him loud and clear and unnaturally steady in his ears. In the beginning, he'd listen to the thrum in the hopes that it'd fall out of rhythm and finally bring him peace. He'd been naïve then. Now he ignores the pounding to the best of his abilities.

_12:25_.

"Mr. Stark?"

Silence fills his head when his heart skips two full beats, lungs catching on the air they so desperately need, and his eyes betray him by snapping to the source of the voice. They fall immediately on a vision that sends ice through his veins and then shut petulantly. No. Damn it. Fuck. _Fuck_.

"FRIDAY," he croaks through the sudden lump in his throat, voice strained from disuse and an unexpected torrent of emotions he has no energy to put names to. "Call Pepper.'

It takes three and a half rings before she picks up. "Tony?"

He says her name on a stuttered exhale and doesn't give a damn whether or not she can hear it. "Pep. It's happening again."

"You're going to have to be a little more specific," she tells him, even, smooth, but growing in concern.

Risking a glance and hoping to god it's just a fluke of his tired mind, Tony cracks open an eye and is met with the same disheveled, pale mirage of Peter as before. "I see him. God, Pep-" he presses the heel of his hands into his eyes until it hurts, "I can't do this. I can't keep doing this."

He's losing his mind and as much as it hurts, it isn't killing him, and he hates it. He hates it. He hates being a burden on the only people he has left. He hates that the sight of big brown eyes brings him to his knees and pushes him off the cliff he'd finally crawled back to the top of and set up shop a safe-ish distance from the edge.

"I thought the hallucinations stopped months ago?"

"So did I."

Peter had followed him around for the better part of a year. He rarely spoke, just stood in the middle of the kitchen or the lab or his bedroom, as if Tony needed a reminder that he fucked up and it cost him more than he was ever willing to lose. So when they finally went away, he'd been grateful. Then guilty.

"I'm not a hallucination."

God, this one is cruel. He'd thought the more interactive ones - the ones that would make a funny face at him from across a worktable or shake his head at the news or call his name in the dead of night - were bad, but this? This is his undoing.

Choking back a sob, he barely catches Pepper whisper over the line, "Peter?"

Tony wants to scream.

"Ms. Potts?"

Tony is definitely going to scream.

"Ohmygod, Peter! How are y- are you okay? What happened?"

Hands falling away from his face, Tony catches the boy's gaze. It's confused and weary and sad and it can't be real. It can't. He can't.

"I-I don't know." The image shifts its weight, but never breaks eye contact. It wrings its hands. "We just… came back." Tony stands, shaky, and approaches. He can't be. He can't. He can't. He can't. "I asked Dr. Strange to bring me home."

He can't be, but fuck if he doesn't look real. The dirt is still smudged on his cheeks and there's a pinch in his brows that instinct begs him to smooth any way he can. It's with a great deal of hesitance that Tony raises his hand - the right one, because it's trembling significantly less than the left - to Peter's cheek, preparing to disturb the picture, to watch it crumble away again. His fingers touch gritty, solid, warm skin. There's no stopping the sob this time, his fingers moving quickly to twist in the hair at the back of the boy's neck. It's still ridiculously soft. "Oh god. Oh my god." Tony pulls Peter into him, gathers the willing body into his arms like he's a toddler, and then stumbles back into the bed because he is definitely not strong enough to support his own weight, let alone another's, and he is definitely not letting go. Ever. "Peter. _Peter_." He's crying and digging his hands through familiar curls and keeping Peter's head tucked safely under his chin.

The kid is even more of a blubbering mess than he is; whatever he is trying to say is completely incoherent, but Tony doesn't care because he's alive and real and _here_ and he never thought he'd have this again. He'll convert to whatever religion worships the god that gave him his heart back. He'll repent for all of his sins and earn this kid he doesn't deserve because if he has to part with him again, it'll surely kill him.

Over their hysterics, he hears Pepper say something, and then the beep of a disconnected call.

He doesn't care.

When they come down from their high, Peter is shaking like a leaf, exhaling stilted, heavy breaths of warm air against his neck. _Before_ , that would have been cause for major concern, but now it's like a dream come true. He's breathing. Because he's alive. Because he came back.

Tony rocks the both of them, but he isn't sure who the comfort is for.

The boy clings to him, fisting the old band t-shirt he's probably been wearing for a week straight with his super-strength, stretching the material beyond repair, digging clenched fingers into his back. "I'm sorry," he whispers eventually, like Tony's entire world doesn't fall away at the words.

Cheesy science posters and miscellaneous Avengers memorabilia fade to a burnt orange, the carpet to sand, the desk to twisted metal. For a moment, the air he breathes is dry and warm and he tastes ash.

Breath hitching, his gentle hands turn tight and bruising until a little whine escapes Peter's throat. "Don't." Tony's voice is hard and brittle and he can't remember talking ever being this difficult. "Don't ever say that to me again. I don't want to hear those words leave your mouth _ever_." His grip loosens slightly, hands returning to running through his hair and making circles on his back, drifting over the material of the original Spider-suit. He can't blame him for not wanting the nanites on anymore. Or ever again. " _I'm_ sorry. I'm so sorry."

"'S not your fault."

"Of course it is," he says, soft, because Peter's too young to understand. All Tony has ever wanted, ever worked for, was to keep him safe, to protect him, to _bring him home_. And he'd failed. Spectacularly. In every way. (They'd buried an empty casket, because he couldn’t even get the last one right). He bites back tears and smooths down the curls his fingers have encouraged from submission, "You're my responsibility."

He feels more than sees Peter's head shake against his shoulder. "Please don't blame yourself."

"That ship sailed, kiddo." _When you begged me to save your life_. Unexpectedly, another bout of tears well up in his eyes and he shuts them tightly to keep them at bay, squeezing the boy - alive, warm, real, _real, he's real_ \- into a hug. "Doesn't matter now. You're okay."

"I'm okay."

God, he's never been happier. Even if the assurance is thick and broken and maybe not wholly believed. Peter is okay.

"You are also banned from field trips, effective immediately."

Peter's soft chuckle is all he never knew he needed. It'd been a rather dark and dull existence without this kid he'd only known for a year and a half, whose energy and optimism had chased the shadows and ghosts from these empty halls, whose smile and laughter softened his heart of ~~iron~~ steel. It'd been a rude awakening, to suddenly have all of that gone. Tony hadn't realized what he'd had until he thought it wasn't coming back.

"Get some rest, Pete," he says, brushing the stubborn curls from his forehead and behind his ear, cherishing every precious strand on his head and every ounce of solid weight sinking slowly into him. "I'm not going anywhere."


End file.
